Have kids, won't travel

Today Kent and I took our kids to the zoo for something called Boo at the Zoo. In case you're too stupid to figure it out by yourself, Boo at the Zoo is annual Halloween celebration where kids and adults can wear costumes in public without looking like they got lost on their way to the Renaissance Festival. We decided that we'd like to experience our kids having hysterical meltdowns in someplace that isn't our house, so this morning we loaded them into the car, ran back inside for water, ran back inside again for a Bear's costume and then went back inside AGAIN for my wallet. Then we drove 45 minutes to our local zoo. ("Local" might be relative.)

Eighteen billion families had the same idea as us, so finding a parking spot involved three arguments, one trip the wrong way down a one-way street, six parking space false alarms, two rage induced tension headaches (me and Kent) and a fifteen minute walk to the zoo entrance. For some reason we never figured out, Bear's dragon costume was wet which was perfect for 38 degree weather. Luckily we had plenty of time to dry it off with a diaper on our walk from the car to the entrance. As it turns out our double-stroller, which is so wonderful on strolls along Cherry Creek trail, is NOT as user friendly in an overly-crowded public venue. But we would not be deterred! We had costumes! And we'd paid $26 to get in!

Of course the first thing we did was find a booth with candy and help ourselves to six pouches of Sour Patch Kids and Swedish Fish. The next half hour was spent attempting to redirect Bear while he slowly ate Swedish Fish and ran into people. (Maybe you're wondering why we didn't put him in his stroller? Obviously because it's easier to steer when it's empty.) All the while we attempted to cajole him into being interested in the animals. Here's a helpful life lesson: kids will always pick corn syrup over majestic animals. The end. Once his candy was gone he became a little more interested in the animals. We showed him the primates and the birds. You might notice that's not very many animals and that might be because two-year-olds have fifteen minute attention spans. Then we got more candy, realized we were an hour and a half overdue for a nap and decided to leave. Here's a parenting tip: a kid who has missed his or her nap may appear fine. Then, out of nowhere, there will be a tantrum equivalent to a nuclear explosion. You will be very, very sad. You face will look something like this:

Leaving before frowny-face stage is crucial. We made it all the way to the car before anyone started to cry. (For the record...it was me. I was tired and hungry and have poor coping skills.) Then Bunny started to cry. And cry. And cry. And cried the whole drive home. In an attempt to not feel helpless I drove home at 80 miles an hour and we got back to our driveway FOUR MINUTES sooner than we would have if I'd followed the rules of the road. That's a win in my book. We put the kids down for their naps and attempted to not kill one another out of mutual frustration and exhaustion. Then we took a nap, ordered pizza and congratulated ourselves on our yearly attempt to leave our town and venture downtown with the kids.

Go here right now

Go here right now or I'm blocking your IP address: God of Cake

Make mine a double

This is going to be brief because I'm working on another essay right now. This morning I was listening to the radio and the DJs were discussing Johnny Depp's appearance at the premier of "The Rum Diaries." Apparently he was very drunk, stumbling around and generally being a fool. The DJs found nothing wrong with this. In fact, it was amusing to them. There was another incident in 2006 when Danny Devito appeared on The View visibly intoxicated and admitted to staying up all night, drinking limoncello with George Clooney. The press treated it as a hilarious joke. No one thought that he should go into rehab or that either was in a serious state of trouble. As with Johnny Depp, it was treated as one of those things that happens from time to time. I'm not sure if you picked up on it, but both of those people are MEN. When female celebrities stumble around acting ridiculous, even when they're out having fun and not at a professional event, the tone of the reporting is seriously judgmental. The reports might not explicitly say that they need to go to rehab but there is certainly prim disapproval. It seems like a double standard. But that's just me.

Margarita

Back in the day, when I was a recent college graduate, my BFF and I used to partake in the occasional mid-afternoon drink. Our favorite thing was to go to Chili's, order queso and margaritas and get pleasantly buzzed. This was super easy for us because we were recent college graduates with no jobs. (Disclaimer: I do not recommend doing this if you have work people pay you for.) Then we got jobs and she eventually moved away so that effectively ended that. Also, it turns out that drinking at 1:00, going to your best friend's house and drinking for a few more hours on a Tuesday is actually not acceptable once you've been out of college for six months. Apparently, college is supposed to teach you three things: your social security number, creative parking and "knowing better." Before long I learned to confine my drinking to normal business drinking hours, also known as 5:30 to 9:30 on weekday evenings and 3:30 to midnight on weekend night unless there was a football or baseball game...but now we're getting complicated. Then I got pregnant. If you want to get a reaction out of people just tell them that you haven't changed your drinking habits since becoming pregnant. This works better if they know you drink three beers a night during the week and um, more than that during the weekend. Obviously giving up drinking during pregnancy was a given but I didn't plan to stop for good. That was boring! And more importantly, boring! And I liked beer! Then I started to give it some realistic thought. I was drinking way too much. It was making me chubby. I didn't like how I felt. So with that I decided that I would give up drinking. It was easy to give it up initially since I was still pregnant and didn't want to turn my baby into one of those kids you see on the news while their parents are being arrested. The challenge would be maintaining my commitment to being alcohol free. Shortly before Bear was born this was made easier when someone very close to me also gave up drinking. I had someone with whom I could be sober and mock people who were drunk! Hallelujah! i won't say that I haven't had a single drink but my drinking now is very minimal. I can tell you honestly, hand on heart, that usually I miss it very little. And then. And then. I have a day like today. It not only makes afternoon drinking look good, it makes late morning drinking seem almost acceptable. I needed to clean my house in a serious way. Even though I have a handy-dandy cleaning guide, sometimes I get behind and need to spend a few hours cleaning our whole house. I'm anal-retentive so I have a very specific system I use when I do that. I start at the back and work my way to the front, which means the master bathroom is the first room I take care of. I got started and halfway through the baby needed to eat. Earlier Bear asked if he could help so I gave him a spray bottle of water and a rag and let him have it. Since he is clever and was most likely bored the minute I left he climbed up and turned on the sink faucet. I wasn't too alarmed when I heard the water starting to run. I just put in a new faucet with a swivel head and he likes to turn the water off and on and wash his hands over and over. I assumed that was what he was doing. The baby finished nursing, I put her down for her nap and went back into the bathroom. Well, in my absence Bear figured out that he could turn the faucet head and let the water run all over the counter, down the cabinet and all over the floor where it caused a minor flood. I've told him before to leave the faucet alone. So needless to say I totally lost my temper. It was bad. I completely overreacted, which left Bear sobbing and me on the verge of tears. I can't tell you how terrible I felt, I was mad at him but mostly I was mad at myself for not keeping my cool. We wiped up the mess, had a hug and spent some time snuggling and watching "Tangled." And then I thought, "Hm, maybe it is ok to have a margarita at 10:30 after all."

The change in person grooming standards

A long, long time ago, like three years, I used to get my eyebrows waxed by a woman named Michelle, who owned an upscale waxing salon downtown. I had the nerve to say obnoxious things like "I don't let anyone but Michelle touch my eyebrows." I would drive fifteen minutes every other week and pay $25 for this service. You might be feeling like you need to throw up right now and that's OK. Then some other things started to take priority. For example, not using credit anymore and paying for groceries. Now, three years on I look like the yeti's cousin and in the words of Tina Fey, my eyebrows "left unchecked will grow straight across my face and onto yours." OK, I just made that up. My untamed eyebrows actually more closely resemble Andy Rooney's. After I stopped getting my brows waxed my mom finally broke down and bought my a lighted magnifying mirror, out of pity or embarrassment I'm not sure. My eyebrows look normal, but not as good as they did during my $50-a-month waxing habit. But you know what I realized? NO ONE LOOKS AT YOUR EYEBROWS THAT CLOSELY. So it's fine. Eyebrows are the worry of vain, rich, white women that don't know real human suffering. Read the reviews on Yelp for the place I used to go. The fact that anyone gives a three-star review to a place that does waxing and isn't affiliated with a dictatorship shows you a lot of people don't have nearly enough to worry about. Anyway. Personal grooming priorities change, especially once you have kids. Even more especially one you have more than one kid. I don't want to depress any would-be moms so I will caveat this by saying I still have the ability to clean up really nice and I could do it everyday but I just don't care that much and I'd rather do other things. Ugh. That was so much better before I put in my politically correct bit wasn't it?

Here I things I did before kids that I don't do now:
1. Style my hair, Every. Single. Day. With a blow dryer, straightening iron, protecting serum and some other stuff I forget.
2. Make-up! Now I only put it on when I'm going someplace special, like Target or Bear's nursery school.
3. Nail polish. Time to put it on but not to take it off. And you know who wears chipped nail polish? Hookers and stripper. I'm pretty sure that's in the Bible.
4. Earrings. I'd have to be crazy to wear earrings with a two-year-old.
5. Clothes that required dry cleaning or hand washing.
6. Shoes with a heel.

In an effort to not be discouraging, there are things I DO do and will never give up. Unless we have another baby.
1. Leg shaving. Funnily enough, I was actually really lazy about this before kids. Now I do it every time I shower. Maybe to extend by two minutes the amount of time I don't have to hear "Mommy."
2. Flossing. Pssh. That's just good oral hygiene.
3. Face washing and moisturizing. Even though I look haggard right now someday, when I get sleep again, I would like to reduce the likelihood I'll look like the Cryptkeeper.
4. Nail clipping. Personal bias: long nails are gross.
5. Eyebrow plucking. To keep my eyebrows in magazine condition I do this once a month, usually after I've been stuck in traffic and spent a lot of quality time looking in the visor mirror in the car under natural light.
6. Showering. Because I have standards.